


Fault

by Gildedmuse



Category: Rent (2005), Rent - Larson
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, F/M, Gen, Grief/Mourning, HIV/AIDS, One Shot, Originally Posted on LiveJournal, Pre-Canon, Suicide, character piece
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-30
Updated: 2019-04-30
Packaged: 2020-02-10 05:27:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18653839
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gildedmuse/pseuds/Gildedmuse
Summary: It's not really anyone's fault that they didn't save April.





	Fault

**Author's Note:**

> [Originally posted to LJ in 2006. Not sure if I like this at all. I wrote it in my modern poerty class, all in one sitting. First thought = best thought, says Ginsberg. This was written under the influence of far too many confessional poets.]

**Fault**

  
  
April must have thought it would be wretchedly beautiful. Morbidly artistic and perfect in its execution. She always had that flare in her to try and create such hellishly gorgeous scenes. Not even the soothing effects of heroin could put out that wildness in her eyes when she had her mind wrapped around these images. It stole the glow from her skin, the graceful bounce in her step, and even that impish smile she wore eventually got torn away by the scabs across her lips as her body fell away from her. None of that ever extinguished her spirit.  
  
Her eyes, light brown and burning with the passion he wanted to pour into his music, are what captured Roger's interest the first time. Mark saw it too, a week after Roger did while they were dancing in front of his camera. Mark caught the fervor heat that sparked between them, so palpable that you could see it in the film, and he was jealous. He wanted that to replace this obsessive, mind numbing attention that he gave his work. He wanted what April had. Roger took what April had.  
  
Her eyes were so alive, and maybe that's why when her hair started thinning and she turned into nothing but a skeleton with a thin layer of bruises and cuts and track marks stretched over her bones no one could bring themselves to see the sickness. Not even Collins, who every one expected to just know these things, said more than a few words of warning to Mark. He said to talk to Roger, but never to April. Maybe there was a sense of hopelessness that had been with her since the moment she stepped into their lives. Looking back it was so clear that she had always been so sick looking, and they call all tell themselves that no one is really to blame. You can't really notice change when it's gained so much momentum.  
  
Mark was so caught up in his scripts, his film, his freedom. Mark was so consumed by his own work and life that he never had time to notice. They'll be fine, he told himself when he did notice and could not brush off the observation as quickly as he would like. He did not want to be his father. It is a rock star thing. It is a bohemian thing. He did not want to be the suburbs he grew up in, always judging. They know what they're doing. They'll work it out for themselves. They'll be fine.  
  
He purposively left out of his thoughts April's dramatics. Her dramatics and her mood swings which any good filmmaker would take into consideration when writing the ending to her story. Mark left that out of his own orchestrations of the Fall of April until it was impossible to ignore. A twist ending that you could see from miles off if you took into consideration her wild ups and downs that don't connect with reality. Sometimes, Maureen said one night while they laid in bed ignoring the sound of slow suicide in the next room, sometimes she worries about April. Sometimes she comes to the loft and April is sitting at the counter with a pill bottle and tears running down her face and Maureen would take away the pills but....  
  
But what else can they do? Read the history of art, Maureen says with more doubt than Mark has ever heard in her voice before, and you'll find that you need to be a little crazy to create. They are bohemians. They do not electrocute their own kind. They will not cut her open and take away what makes April April just for a cure.  
  
In one of those down phases, April says artists are obsessed with death because, "Once you die there are no more morals or judgments or commercialization. There is only a beautiful corpse left to feed the Earth."  
  
April must have thought she was beautiful, sprawled out on the floor and leaking her life into the cracks of the tiles. It must have been very poetic to her, for her life to burn out this way. Very wretchedly beautiful, morbidly artistic. Had she only known about the stench.  
  
*  
  
It's the first thing that hits Mark. Before he is even in the door, he can smell it. God, it's awful. He doesn't smell wonderful himself, out all nights wandering the streets’ homeless all for a good shot. Still, this is worse than fish and alcohol and sweat and grime. "Fuck," he curses as he stumbles into the loft, and it only gets worse. He puts down his camera and pulls his shirt up over his nose, not that it really helps. "Collins!" he yells, voice muffled by his sweater as he presses his hand over his face to try and block out some of that smell. "I swear to God! Sticking a cocktail down our toilet is not a way to promote anarchy!"  
  
That must be what it is, or else Roger dropped something in the toilet accidentally and now the sewers have backed up into their apartment. The entire place smells like shit. Either way, Mark is not cleaning this up. Fuck them if they think he is going to shovel shit back down the toilet.  
  
He goes to the bathroom to see what went wrong. The door is open, the light is on, the girl is dead. Deflated and pale she lies there. The smell is decay, the blood congealed around her. Not flowing anymore.  
  
Something catches in Mark's throat. A scream, sob, curse. The silence is like the stench, overpowering and suffocating and indefinable unless you stand over the corpse of a girl you love. An artist would be having a moment of reflection. Taking in all the details of her body bent in an odd angle over the floor and wondering about the thin line between this sickness and death. Mark turns away. Food and acid burn up his throat. He is choking, vomiting into his shirt still pressed against his mouth, the cold chunks of lunch dipping down his stomach. Retching until he can't breathe.  
  
Wild eyes glazed over, unblinking and hazed out.  
  
Mark collapses, face to face with her as he tries to hold himself up. Everything comes spewing out of his mouth. He didn't even know his body could hold this much, that anything could hurt as much as his gut does right now. April lies there as Mark's mouth burns with the taste of acid that comes dribbling down his lips. She never says a word.  
  
Eventually it turns to dry heaving, choking on the smell alone it seems as his body tries to empty that out of him as well. It's only then that Mark can drag himself across the room, as far from the bathroom as he can make it and collapse against the couch. Shaking and broken and mind and heart racing.  
  
He needs to call someone. The hospital, but what can they do for her now? Who do you call for this? His mom, but she wouldn't understand. He just needs someone to tell him it isn't his fault. It's not his fault. Roger. God, what about Roger. He needs to call Collins. He'll know what to do. What did he say to April this morning before going out with Maureen? Did he say anything to her at all? Why can't he hear her voice? Where is Maureen now? Does she know? Does anyone but him know? Why would April do this to him? How could she leave herself like that for him to find? It's not his fault. He doesn't want it to be, does he? God, how could he even think that? Is he really so selfish? He needs to call someone. He needs to save her. He should have saved her. He couldn't save her. He hates himself now, for even thinking he could. Her life is not his. It had been out of his control.   
  
*  
  
At the funeral, Roger is the only one crying.  
  
It's weird, this sort of frozen state Mark feels himself living in. He feels so isolated from everything around him. Even Maureen, sitting right beside him and clinging to his arm. There is an obvious feeling in the room. This had been inevitable, unavoidable. Everyone is thinking it, and so their minds turn to other things so they don't have to notice the tears running down Roger's face. Mark is thinking about how his relationship with Maureen seems to be going nowhere.  
  
He's sitting at his friend's funeral, contemplating how miserable his own life is. At least it keeps his mind from other things. Besides, this isn't his fault. Collins saw how sick she was, Maureen saw the pills she wanted to take, and Roger was supposed to be taking care of her. This isn't Mark's fault. How could he have known? How could he have seen this coming? He is just the director, after all. He only documented the Fall of April. It wasn't his job to get involved.  
  
At the funeral, Roger is the only one crying. Silent tears that drip down his face as he stares at the casket. It's the first time he hasn't been high in a week. "It's my fault," he whispers, breaking the silence of the room that is closing around the friends. Friends that sit apart from each other, that can't look each other in the eye over the coffin of poor April. So much passion, they all think. It's too bad about what happened to her. It couldn't have been prevented. There is no way they could have done anything differently.  
  
Only Roger seems to feel the guilt. "It's my fault she's gone," he repeats, fresh tears making the way down his cheeks. He's addicted and sick and has just lost the girl he loved. His entire body shakes just from the feelings that are ripping him apart. Mark thinks, how can you capture that in a script? You just can't. "Fuck, how could I do this to her?"  
  
No one speaks up. No one corrects him.


End file.
